An eight-game match just concluded in Miskolc, Hungary between two of the World's very best chess players: World Champion Vladimir Kramnik and perennial Top-10 player Peter Leko, formerly the youngest grandmaster in history.These two met for the biggest stakes just under three years ago, when they played in Brissag0, Italy for the Classical World Championship in 2004. Leko led the match 7-6 with one game left, but Kramnik won that final game and retained his title with a score of 7-7 because of his draw odds by virtue of being the champion.
Kramnik and Leko seem to be on friendly terms, unlike Kramnik and Topalov after their match last fall. They are also positionally-oriented players, and are not averse to making draws which has brought much criticism to them both.
This match was won by Kramnik with a score of two wins, one loss, and five draws (4.5-3.5). However, most of the draws were of the very interesting variety and were not the kind of draws these two normally are lambasted for!
Obviously, Leko is a national hero in Hungary, and this match was held in the National Theatre. Rapid chess is played at a time control of 25 minutes + 10 seconds added after every move starting from move 1. Two games were played per day, with a a press conference and a two-hour break between each game.
Last year Leko played a match here with 12th World Champion Anatoly Karpov, which he won 4.5-3.5, the same score he lost to Kramnik by this year.
For complete coverage, you can visit the ChessBase website.
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